Windsor shows good teamwork

Communication has always been the key to success, regardless of where it’s applied. The town of Windsor finally got that memo.

With the final approval of the Great Western Industrial Park, everyone involved in this gargantuan development should pat themselves on the back.

We applaud the town for recognizing what this will do economically for Windsor residents as well as for being willing to bend a bit.

We applaud school officials for working with Great Western to make sure Windsor Re-4 School District isn’t taxed on resources and that the safety of our children is managed.

But mostly, we applaud Eric Swanson, senior vice president of BROE, and Alex Yeros, BROE managing director, for sticking with Windsor and making this the best possible development it can be.

The great Wal-Mart debate in Windsor more than two years ago sparked a reputation among commercial and industrial developers that this western Weld County town is anti-growth.

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Windsor hired consultant Robert Tipton to investigate the claims, and after several weeks of investigating, Tipton confirmed it: Windsor wasn’t very developer friendly.

Several elections and ordinances later, that changed. BROE Co. — a transportation and real estate giant from Denver which, through its affiliate Omnitrax Inc., owns the Great Western Railway — helped prove that.

The Great Western Development Co., an affiliate of BROE, realized that Windsor was a prime spot to lure in heavy industrial businesses that rely heavily on rail transportation. After all, there’s a railway in the heart of the town plus Windsor is surrounded by acres of open land,

BROE bought 1,400 of acres of land surrounding Kodak Colorado Division’s Windsor plant and the debate began again.

Many hinted that Windsor couldn’t manage the development of 1,400 acres. Great Western wanted nearly 4,000 homes on roughly 700 acres of property and another 700 acres of industrial use. Windsor officials didn’t know what to do. It never thought Kodak would sell the property in the first place, so it was not part of its growth management plan.

Windsor did what it does best when denying the original annexation and master plan. But Great Western wasn’t ready to give up, and it gave Windsor time to look at the property. The Eastside Subarea plan was approved, and Great Western had direction for what Windsor wanted.

In the final approval, Great Western got 318 acres of heavy industrial, 163 acres of limited industrial use and 2,000 homes — still more than Windsor wanted, but the town board had learned to compromise.

Hanging in there was something the developers didn’t have to do. At any time, Great Western could have taken its plan to the Board of Weld County Commissioners. While we don’t know if the commissioners would have approved the plan. Windsor had every reason to worry that they would. The industrial park could bring upward of $160 million in revenue to Windsor over a 10-year build-out period. Had that money been diverted to Weld County, Windsor would have been stuck with all the headaches and no benefit.

Great Western even named the development’s presentation “Made in Windsor.”

Made in Windsor it was, thanks to everyone working together to make this Weld town a better place to live.

Everyone involved in the project should be proud. But the job is not complete. Those 1,400 acres are a lot of land to develop, and it won’t happen overnight.

The lines of communication need to remain open, and everyone should help each other make the Broe project one that communities can look to as an example of good teamwork.